Tiger's Mate

Chapter 42

I put my hand on his shoulder, effectively shutting him up. He didn't startle, but he stilled under my touch, his entire body taut before it went lax. My eyes were opened now, I had moved to face him. Ethan looked at me over his shoulder, his eyes calm, though the solemnity was still there.

"Finally decided to quit dosing off did you?" he muttered, glaring at me even though the look lacked its genuine chill. Instead, he simply looked tired.

I tried to grin back at him, but I knew it was strained. I could have told him the truth. Could have told him I had been listening in all along."Couldn't afford to," I said instead, "you were freaking out for a moment there. You really can't keep a level head without me around can you."

He looked away and shook his head so that his bangs fell over his eyes. "You're such an ass." He looked back at me. "How much did you hear?"

He gave me the knowing look.

"Enough," I answered quietly, looking him dead in the eye as I turned to lay better. "This is not your fault."

He opened his mouth, and I knew that he was going to argue, before he could, I leaned over and kissed him.

* * *

Once I was awake — and everyone else knew it — we got to talking. They seemed adamant at leaving all conversations involving the name 'Kallen' in the we're-not-discussing-these-pack-matters-in-the-presence-of-a-werecat zone. Well, actually, it was more like they were doing it because the guy/wolf had just torn my shoulder to pieces — though it felt alright now!

I stopped laying down — despite Ethan's protests to rest more. So sitting beside him, now both of us on the couch, I decided to clean him up a bit. It was obvious he wasn't going to do it any time soon, and apparently he had snapped at Maia when she tried to say anything about his own wounds. But I wasn't going to let him get away with leaving them as they were.

"Stop moving," I ordered calmly as I applied some of that strange ointment Maia had used on me to the scratches on his arms and face.

"They're not that bad," he grumbled. So I flicked him in the unscratched up part of his forehead until he agreed to stop getting me to try and stop.

Instead, I got to thank the other two she-wolves for their help. Sage seemed more curious about me being a 'cat' than anything else.

"No wonder he smelled so weird!" She had said. To which Maia had agreed.

"Oh you're right! At first I just assumed it was the human 'boy' smell. No offence."

Instead of showing how mildly offended I indeed was learning the prospect that these wolves thought I smelt weird, I started telling them a bit about myself and my old clan. Before I realized it, they were laughing away with me and I felt...comfortable around them. Sage didn't scare — ahem — intimidate me as much as she had when we initially got introduced. I learned Ethan's closer pack mates were quite interesting people.

Ethan was...oddly silent during those few hours we spent at the cabin. Sage and Maia had a bag of snacks they had had with them when they found us, but he didn't eat.

I tried not to worry but...I felt it, being so close to him, he wasn't as alright as he wanted us to believe.

* * *

"What are you doing?"

I was in a bit of pain — not going to lie — even after chugging a shit-ton of whatever medicine Maia had kindly forced me to swallow.

I had never been good at taking medicine, even as a kid. But my clan had always been a lot nicer about force-feeding it to me. Maia was just downright grab-you-by-the-throat-and-drown-you-until-you-swallow.

But back to the focus at hand — namely, my boyfriend thinking it necessary to carry me on his back. If the fact that he was transformed and crouching on his paws, lowering himself to the ground, and staring at me with a pointed blue look, was any indication.

When I didn't get on, Ethan huffed loudly and flicked his tail, glaring.

"I'm not riding on you," I told him. Being injured like this was embarrassing enough.

The corner of his mouth curved, like a mockery of his human smirk on the face of his transformed self.

'You've done it before...'

"Huh when did I—" I suddenly understood why he was smirking, and my face went red. "F-fucking hell that was obviously different!" I shouted, embarrassingly flustered.

Still, he did not give in. Ethan stayed waiting in that crouched position, eyes following my every move.

'Please'

I heard inside my head.

Goddess. He so rarely said that...and he looked so pleading too...

"Ugh, fine! You're so damn stubborn," I grumbled as I sighed and walked over to mount over his back.

I couldn't see it—but I just knew he was smirking.

Ethan came to a rough stop right in front of the door to my house/not my house. For someone who had been running steadily for half an hour, after a fight, while carrying me on his back, he was hardly panting. With a tired yawn,  I leaned to my current better side—intending to slide off when he lowered himself. But he didn't. I cleared my throat. Surely he didn't want me to jump off him from this height...right? It was like jumping off a horse—size wise, at least.

Fine, if that's how it's gonna be, I mentally grumbled to myself—right before the dumb dog   started moving again. I yelped quietly as I gripped onto his fur to keep from falling face-first into his neck. The wolf let out a laughish snort before he kicked my/not my front door open with a paw and strode inside like it was completely normal. For starters, it was a wonder he actually fit through the door with me on him. Secondly, he was getting his muddy paws in the floor!

"H-hey!" I blurted, jerking forward again as his back suddenly arched in a bridge without warning. Unprepared, I was tossed into the air—at the same time he shifted, and caught me in his arms with a smug look. I was blushing. "Y-that's not how you treat an injured person!" Was my only deflection.

His smirk widened to show a hint of his teeth, but his eyes were soft. "As you wish, Kitty."

I was carried—still bridal style—over the the couch where he ever so tenderly lay me down on the couch, like I was fragile, like I was something irreplaceable. I could only stare at him, my brain hazy with something and my heart beating warmly. God, I really loved him. It seemed a strangely random thought in the moment...but after everything that had just happened, to me, it could not seem more right a time.

That was why when he began to draw away and head back the way he had come I panicked and sat up. "Wait—don't go!" It may have been an overreaction, but he didn't seem taken off.

Ethan turned to look over his shoulder, his smile soft. He closed the open door. Oh. And then he walked back over, kneeling down at my side.

"I'm not leaving you." He stroked the side of my cheek as he spoke. I pressed my hand to the back of his, holding it there.

"Okay."

And then the stupid doorbell—which I didn't even know worked—rang and completely ruined the moment.